


Labels

by Zoya113



Category: Black Friday - Team StarKid, The Guy Who Didn't Like Musicals - Team StarKid
Genre: F/M, Hurt and comfort, angst but like soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-11
Updated: 2019-11-11
Packaged: 2021-01-27 15:51:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,040
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21394732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zoya113/pseuds/Zoya113
Summary: Paul wants to know why Emma won’t put a label on their relationship but that requires a level of vulnerability from Emma she struggles to show.
Relationships: Paul Matthews/ Emma Perkins
Comments: 5
Kudos: 79





	Labels

**Author's Note:**

> This was suggested by plutoisaplanet and turned out a bit more aggressive than I planned to but it gets there I promise lmao

“Uh who’re you?” 

“Uh, I’m Paul.” It was a bigger question than Paul was prepared to answer. “I’m Emma’s uh...” in his split pause he noticed Emma grow tense. “Boyfriend,” he answered.

“Oh well we haven’t put a label on it yet,” she gave a slight laugh, speaking faster than usual almost as if she could rush that idea out of the child’s head soon enough. 

“But we are intimate,” Paul jumped to clear up. He didn’t want his first impression with someone who may one day be his nephew to to be a liar.  
But then he glanced back at the stark horror that just dawned on Emma’s face. 

What was that look she had given him? It was hard to tell because after a second her head dropped down to cover the redness of her face. 

“Uh, you know, Tim!” He tried to forget it, striding around to the other side of the couch to carry on the conversation, pretended it hadn’t happened. 

Emma’s smile came right back as she looked back down at Tim, but then he made a stupid mistake. The bumper cars. And Emma was giving him that stricken look again. Maybe it was better to shut up, smile and nod and let Emma steer the conversation until they had settled in. 

“I’m bored,” Tim had said after a while.

They had been through two movies, and he had gotten stuck on a level of a game he couldn’t pass. 

Emma was helpless when it came to games, but she started shooting glances at Paul to ask for his help. She pointed one finger at the remote and jerked her head at the TV. 

Paul took in a deep breath, his jaw opening to speak but no words came out.  
If he said something, he’d mess it up. Whatever he was going to do it wouldn’t be right for Emma. He understood that, she was under a lot of pressure to be the perfect aunt and he didn’t want to ruin that for her by saying something dumb. 

Emma raised one eyebrow as Tim set down the controller with a sigh of boredom. ‘Help him,’ she mouthed. 

“Hey, maybe if we’re done inside we could go out for lunch or something! I’ll pay!” He offered. 

Tim lit up, “really! I’ll go get dressed!” He bolted up from the couch, his slippers sliding on the floor as he turned the corner to his room too quickly. 

“Paul!” Emma snapped, trying to keep her voice down so Tim wouldn’t hear. “Why’d you say that! I just wanted you to help him play his game. We can’t take the kid out, we’re baby sitting!” 

Paul flushed, feeling a sweat break out on his forehead. And for a second he actually wanted to cry, he didn’t understand why everything he said was wrong. He swallowed, staring at Emma as he searched for his answer. 

“Why’re you acting so weird. Can’t you see I’m stressed? I don’t need this Paul, I don’t need you getting all weird on me. Now I have to tell the kid we can’t go out.” She stood up, heaving a sigh and groaning as she went. 

“Emma, wait,” he spoke up. “I feel bad.”

“Okay, that’s good Paul. Don’t worry about it, I’ll sort everything out with him.” Her shoulders had fallen and the circles under her eyes were more present than usual. She really didn’t need him to get emotional right now but he couldn’t take the way his heart was racing - with anger or sadness or confusion, it was going so fast it was nauseating and he couldn’t carry on like this without getting sick. 

“No Emma. I feel mad. I feel mad at-at you,” he stated, trying not to back out last second. 

“What?” Emma almost laughed to cope with her frustration. “Can’t we save this for when we’re home? Look. I’m sorry, I don’t know what I did but I’m sorry. Tom made it quite clear to me that I’m the family disappointment, I can’t handle two people being disappointed in me right now, can this chat please just wait until later?” She begged. “I have to go tell the kid we can’t go out and-“ her words died into a whine and she fiddled with her hat, making sure it was on her head right. “Just tell me what I’ve done then.” 

Paul looked her up and down once. It didn’t seem like she could handle the feeling either.  
“I want to put a label on it,” he told her. “I mean we’ve been dating for ages now, why did you tell him I wasn’t...?” He couldn’t say that word now, ‘boyfriend,’ Emma had deemed it bad. 

“He’s a kid, Paul. You can’t just come in and tell a ten year old about our love life! That was so embarrassing! You could have just said we’re dating and stopped there!” She held out her hands to tell him the conversation was over but he didn’t want to leave it there, and so he pressed further. 

“We aren’t just ‘dating’ Emma, we live together. We share the same bed every night.” He shouldn’t have to remind her. His hands started to quivering, waiting for Emma’s response. “I think we’re pretty committed at this point, right?”

She put her hand to her head, her eyes flicking wildly around the room for some sort of distraction. “Can we not do this here? There’s a lot to unpack and-“ 

“You hurt my feelings Emma,” he told her. 

“Paul, Paul,” she scurried back to the couch, kneeling on the floor instead of sitting down so she could get up faster. She took her hands in his. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. But we can’t do this here. I can’t just be vulnerable on command so if you wanna label it that has to wait until we’re home. Do you understand? Can you just do that for me? You love me right?” 

Paul balled up his shaking hands. “I love you. Do you love me?”

Emma’s eyes widened. “What?” 

“Are you embarrassed of me or something?”

Emma glanced over her shoulder, preparing for Tim to come back at any second. She shook her head and when her head came to a still he noticed tears forming in her eyes. “I do love you, man! Look, now I’m, ugh.” She wiped her eyes a little too harshly as if threatening herself not to start crying. “I’m not embarrassed of you, Paul,” she lowered her voice down to a hiss. “I’m embarrassed of me, man!”

“Wait... What!?” 

“I didn’t show up to my own sister’s wedding! I was missing in action for a whole ass decade and now I’m just showing up out of the blue like ‘hey! I’m settled down, I didn’t acknowledge your family but you all better acknowledge mine! Even you, you ten year old child!’ I don’t want to show up like I’m better than them all of a sudden, I just want them to like me!” Her eye twitched and the tears started. She didn’t whimper or sob but her lips shook and she wrenched her eyes shut until they stopped, hiding herself from Paul’s reaction. 

“Emma!” He gaped. “You could’ve just told me! No, it’s not like that!” He spoke as quickly as he could so he could get her to stop crying. “You’re in your head, they don’t hate you for being in love!”

“But how do you know that! You know how I feel?” She paused to prepare her words, looking very deep in thought. “I’ve missed out on Tim’s life and the last of Jane’s. I missed the engagement and the wedding and the baby shower. I remember when Jane text me about this guy she met and I didn’t even reply until a week later because I didn’t have any internet! And now I’ve magically appeared in their lives for the first time with all that big news business and it’s like a big sign that says ‘pay attention to me!’” She swallowed and her jaw was shaking when she caught her breath. “I feel like Tim and Tom have always blamed me a bit for what happened to Jane. If I had been in her life a little bit more maybe something would’ve been different. I don’t think they like me much, and I’m not helping by drawing attention to myself. D’you get it?” She looked up. She wasn’t usually shy but she was searching his face for any sign of validation, frightened of his rejection.

Paul mumbled. He couldn’t gather the right words to tell her just how wrong she was, they didn’t blame her, she blamed herself. But it was a great indicator of her stress levels. “Thank you for sharing that with me, Em. I know that isn’t easy for you. I’m being unfair with you.”

“I love you, man. You know I hate saying that to your face so you better appreciate it now!” A strange combination of anger and sorrow raged in Emma’s body and Paul could tell. “When you live the way I do and you don’t end up a touchy-feely sort of person but it’s us, Paul! Think about all the stuff I told you just today! I said if we fail Tom will never invite ‘us’ over again, we’re a package deal man. We’re together all the time, I thought you knew I felt like that!”

Paul took hold of Emma’s hands, entwining their fingers. But at the same time part of him needed her to stop wiping away her tears, he needed to know she really was feeling that way. “I’m sorry, Emma. I know you don’t like all that romance stuff. I’m sorry I was rushing you to an answer, you don’t need this right now. I get it.”

She shook her head firmly before wiping her eyes on her shoulder. “No, you weren’t rushing me. You’re right, it’s been forever. I upset you and that was an asshole move, let’s do it Paul. We’ll put a label on it. Officially.” Her shake turned into a nod. “Sorry for making you think you aren’t worth it, or something. I’m gonna fix things, starting with this kid.”

“Thanks, Emma. I feel better now. I feel really happy.” Excited, he leant down to kiss her forehead but she shot up and kissed him on the lips instead.  
When he pulled back he giggled. His heart didn’t slow back down, but it was beating happily now. He didn’t feel like he was going to be sick at all.

“I’m ready to go!” Tim raced back into the living room, pumping his fist. His outfit was terribly uncoordinated, and it was then that Paul remembered just how young Tim was. 

“Uh, I’m sorry Tim we can’t-“ Paul started meekly, his mood falling. 

“Yeah, alright then. Let’s go Tim. Anywhere you want. We’re going to have a great time, a fun little nephew-aunt quality time. A uh,” she looked over at Paul. “Nephew, aunt and her boyfriend quality time.” 

The word didn’t quite roll off Emma’s tongue as they should have but they were there nonetheless. 

“A what?” Tim laughed. 

“Well we’ll get to know each other better! I get to learn about my nephew and you get to learn about your aunt.” She linked arms with Paul before shoving her hands into her pockets. She gave an awkward smile. “And you get to learn a bit about Paul, he’s going to be your cool uncle one day, just so you know.” She rocked back and forth on her heels nervously. “I-is that okay?”

“Yeah. Why wouldn’t it be?” He shrugged. 

“Did you hear that?” Paul unlinked arms with Emma to put his around her shoulders. “She’s my girlfriend,” Paul bounced giddily on the tips of his toes. 

“Okay. Can we go now?” He pulled at Emma’s hand, sliding his feet on the floor in an attempt to walk forward. 

Paul wanted to catch Emma’s smile. Now she couldn’t deny the fact that Tim wasn’t blaming her, purely because he truly didn’t care. 

“Yeah. Okay,” she nodded, squeezing Paul’s hands tight in hers. “Let’s go then kid. Together.”


End file.
